Posts tagged Density

In 2011 and 2015, the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M released an “Urban Mobility Report” which grabbed a lot of headlines, like “Washington area tied with Chicago for traffic congestion, study finds.” The study led me and many others to write articles debunking its bad methodology. Keep reading…

Ward 3 and Ward 6 both include some of the most highly-valued residential neighborhoods in the District. Both are predominately composed of single-family homes, as shown in the maps above, yet the look and feel of each ward is strikingly different. Keep reading…

Attend a live taping of “Kojo in Your Community: Entrepreneurship East of the River” from 6 to 8 pm Tuesday, July at the Anacostia Playhouse. Join GGWash and the Urban Land Institute (ULI) for a panel discussion on climate change, Thursday, August 8, 6-8 pm at 700 Pennslyvania Avenue SE.Attend a fun letter writing party for more density at 6:30 pm today (Monday) at the Cleveland Park Library, 3210 Connecticut Ave NW, and more in this week’s events. Keep reading…

DC’s population growth has slowed since the 2009 boom 10 years ago, but the population still continues to climb. In December, the US Census Bureau announced that DC’s population reached 702,455, officially passing the 700,000 mark. Keep reading…

Last year my family and I decided to visit Cape May, New Jersey for the first time after a lifetime of mostly sticking to beaches closer to DC. We liked it so much we went back again this year. One reason we returned is because the area is laid out a bit differently than most beach towns. Cape May offers a great example of a walkable and historic place. Keep reading…

We all know Mid-Atlantic summers can be oppressively hot and humid. To me, sultry days in Richmond feel like I’m walking around inside someone else’s mouth! The bad news (for me and anyone else who experiences heat as a sweaty human) is that the number of days per year with a heat index—or a “feels-like” temperature—above 95°F is expected to at least double by mid century. Let’s talk about how land use factors into this equation. Keep reading…

An Oregon bill could make denser housing, like duplexes and fourplexes, legal statewide. A new game lets you build a transit system. A Vancouver grocer uses embarrassing designs on plastic bags to encourage customers to use reusable ones. Keep reading…

The Fairfax County Planning Commission is about to take up a proposal to change some of the zoning in Reston and allow for more people to live in certain areas near transit. Known as “Planned Residential Communities (PRC),” the proposal would raise the person-per-acre cap across those areas from 13 to 15. Keep reading…

Replacing single-family homes with duplexes and fourplexes is an important step, but we also need more apartments. Why is vehicle ownership growing in the country's most transit-oriented cities? The rise of “smart cities” has also sparked deep concerns about surveillance and lack of privacy. Keep reading…

As of 2017, Alexandria lost 90% of the affordable housing it had back in 2000. The city could start to address this shortage by adding housing in areas currently zoned for single-family homes, in a way that would mimic some of its best neighborhoods. Keep reading…

In her second inaugural address, DC mayor Muriel Bowser called for 36,000 new homes in DC, 240,000 in the Washington region, and targets for overall homes, workforce homes, and deeply affordable homes in every ward and neighborhood of the District. It's a bold vision. Keep reading…

Fairfax is a big county with big plans. New transit lines accompanied with ambitious land use plans aim to transform areas like Tysons Corner, Reston, and Herndon in the northern half of the county, while the Embark Richmond Highway Plan is guiding growth in the southern portion. But what about the middle? Keep reading…

On the heels of the recent Amazon HQ2 announcement, important questions have been raised about how to accommodate the 25,000 new employees who will come to the Washington region. Our housing demand far outstrips the supply, even without Amazon. Keep reading…

Amazon's second (or third, who's counting?) headquarters is coming to National Landing—or more precisely, the weird no-man's-land that currently separates Pentagon City from Crystal City. Building offices on this site will require rezoning a site currently slated to become 1,400 houses. Keep reading…

Despite some strong backlash, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors is moving ahead with its original proposal to rewrite part of its zoning code to allow for more growth in Reston. Increases to certain density caps suddenly became a contentious issue last year, even though they were just technical changes to fit with the updated Reston Master Plan. Keep reading…

Reston is set to grow a lot over the next couple of decades as Metro's Silver Line is completed, transforming parts of the area from quiet, isolated office parks to denser office and apartment buildings. However, it's important to remember that density is just one measure of what a community feels like, and there are many ways to arrive at the same numbers of people per square mile. Keep reading…

Reston's neighborhood association is asking Fairfax County to give it more control over future growth, as residents try to figure out how to absorb new neighbors without losing community ties. In an area that prides itself on being inclusive, a contentious planning process has revealed some big tensions over increasing density. Keep reading…

Recently a group of neighbors along 16th Street NW, many from a gated community called Beekman Place, applied to downzone an area near Meridian Hill (Malcolm X) Park in order to stop a nine-story building from being built… despite the fact that the buildings across the street are almost the same height. Keep reading…

The historic, long-abandoned Crummell School and the surrounding area in the Ivy City neighborhood in Northeast DC are planned for redevelopment. Out of the three proposals put forward, the city recently chose the proposal that builds the most new homes, including a significant number of affordable homes. Keep reading…

Christian Dorsey, the vice-chair of the Arlington County Board, gave an amazing speech at the Alliance for Housing Solutions’ annual Leckey Forum in June. He talked about historical racism in our housing policy, about environmental justice in locating infrastructure and polluting industry. And he tied it to today’s debates over housing and density in a powerful way. Keep reading…